Updated France Campaign with Strategies

[Ricky B]

David Guegan and I, along with the help of a number of others, have come up with a revised France campaign with strategies. It is available here at the Blitz - 0510_91. There is a read me with details, but briefly it includes a fully redone Belgian deployment with almost all new unit types, based on input of two Belgians that David worked with. Both sides get strategies to choose from, allowing important choices to be made by both sides in advance of the action starting. The weakest Allied units defensively, with the defensive rating of 10 for foot infantry, have been boosted to 12, compared to 16 for the Germans.

If you play it, please send comments to David or myself.

Regards
Rick

[Ricky B]

I forgot, I believe the file must be setup by the staff to work for downloading, so I have passed it on to Steel God and will let you know when it is ready to download.

Rick

Okay, Steel God has it fixed up and ready to download. Just gave it a try and all worked well.

[Dog Soldier]

Having helped Rick with some of the testing, I have to say this is a going to be a great scenario that is played often. The strategy options are well thought out. The Allies and Germans have choices to make which allow for a different game every time played. The strategies alter the setup of the CG, so one can not be sure where the other player has concentrated his forces.

Dog Soldier

[jonnymacbrown]

Thanks very much guys. France 1940 is now one of the best PzC games, with great scenarios, graphics and a great map! Thanks for all your work. You have made an important contribution to the history of wargaming, no exaggeration. Prinz von Egan:happy:

[sja_ski]

Ricky (and others):

What were you able to do about the Corps Attachment issue with different strategies? As you know in our play testing. I found that many Axis Corps originally subordinate to AG A and PG Kliest experience "out of Command" results frequently. This has let me to basically "orphan" these corps since in he Balance attack strategy of the Axis 2 Corps originally assigned to AG A in the historical campaign appear as reinforcements in he AG B sector (in the north). I solved the problem by changing Corps Attachments of the division to AG B Corps, but you would have to agree that this is not the best way to run an offensive! The results is more divisions assigned to one Corp; effects are Corps units have to command more formation over a larger front and if these limited number of corps go Out of Command, more formation can be in turn Low Ammo or Low Fuel.

Steve.

[Ricky B]

Good question Steve, and it is discussed in the read me file with it so that new players of it know what is going on. Basically, there are duplicate HQs for PzGr v Kleist and its subordinate Korps HQs that are all assigned to Heeres-Gruppe B. If a non-historical strategy is chosen, then these HQs are used as needed, although the units still start out assigned to the historical structure. However, come the first corps attachment phase, the various divisions and corps support units can be reassigned to these duplicate HQs which report to the duplicate v Kleist HQ which reports to H-G B and so all can be kept close together.

For the balanced strategy, there are both the historical and duplicate v Kleist HQs, one for the units in the south and one in the north. Also, the units directly subordinate to PzGr v Kleist are duplicated for the right wing strategy and removed from the historical since the entire gruppe is in the north then.

I tested it and it worked the way I wanted it - the very first midnight/corps attachment turn will still be an issue until reassignments happen, but I couldn't figure out a solution without trying to duplicate every single unit and then make sure it all matched the alternate setups - I tried that and kept making errors so I gave it up.

Thanks for the input on it too. By the way, I have a solution for our game that can work too, mention it to me offline if you are interested and I will send you an OOB tweak to resolve it going forward, if worthwhile.

Rick

[jonnymacbrown]

[Tortue Agile]

Hi von Egan,

We didn't change the disposition of the 2e DLC and 5e DLC (Light Division Cavalry), the only difference with before is that the 5th is not fixed any more.
The only change in the placements of the allied troops in the Ardennes has been done for the Belgians.

I hope you will enjoy this version.

[jonnymacbrown]

In 0510_04 which is a large 140 turn scenario on the German drive through the Ardennes to Abbeville, the 5th DLC is scattered about the Ardennes forest with its HQ @ Bertrix. Now the 5th is nicely concentrated @Sedan. The 1sr Cavalry in 0510_04 is also pushed far forward where it is easily over-run by 10th Panzer. Now, the 1st Cavalry is strongly placed @ Messincourt. Right, the 2nd DLC is in the same place, it just looked so much better with those other two outfits concentrated. I assume you fellows designed 0510_04, and I assumed that the French dispositions in that scenario generally reflected overall Frech deployments in all the scenarios prior to this new one. von Egan:conf:

[Tortue Agile]

To do the new scenario we started by using the big campaign in 180 turns as a base. I had to remove the Belgians and then the French armies involved in the strategic options. Rick did the same with the Germans. etc...

If you open the scenario editor and look at the original 180 turns scenario and the new (with strategic option) you will see that the 2 DLC and the 5e DLC haven't moved.

The Ardennes scenario you are talking about reflect more the position of the French at the time of the encounter with the German I think... But you know it has been done 2 years ago so I may forget stuff, I am not that old but I don't have a very good memory. :)